


The Shape of Your Walking Away

by victoria_p (musesfool)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Episode Tag, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-14
Updated: 2009-11-14
Packaged: 2017-10-02 18:04:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,306
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/musesfool/pseuds/victoria_p
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean's been watching Sam walk away his whole life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Shape of Your Walking Away

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to angelgazing and amberlynne for handholding. 1,250 words.

i.

Dean remembers when Sam learned to walk, remembers teaching him, Sam's chubby fingers curled around his as they walked the room. He doesn't know where they were, he just remembers Sam pulling himself upright on the edge of a coffee table, small hand slapping the wood and diaper-clad butt slapping the floor when he let go and couldn't get his balance. Dean laughed, so Sam laughed and heaved himself back up to try again, reaching for Dean to hold him up when he couldn't do it on his own.

He remembers showing Dad, later, once Sam had gotten the hang of it, sweaty fingers uncurling themselves from around Dean's as Dean said, "Go on, Sammy, walk to Daddy," and Sam waddled the few feet to where their father stood in the doorway. Dad had smiled then, a real smile, like he used to before the fire, and swung Sam up into his arms. Dean had run across the room to join them, and climbed up Dad's body like a spider-monkey, and Dad had hugged them both close, blinking away tears Dean didn't understand until years later.

*

ii.

Sam was in fourth grade the first time he'd tried to run away. He'd just read From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, and decided he was going to live in the Field Museum. Dean found him trudging down the street towards the gleaming Chicago skyline, backpack stuffed with clothes and books.

"You could come with me," he said, "like Jamie went with Claudia." He even sounded like he meant it.

"I don't think so."

"Well, I'm going anyway."

Dean bit the inside of his cheek to keep from yelling. With Sam, stealth usually worked better than blunt force. He nodded. "I hope you packed enough salt." Sam gave him a skeptical look, and he shrugged. "Everybody knows the Field Museum is haunted. Lots of cursed objects there, too." He pretended not to notice when Sam's shoulders slumped. "Call if you need help, though. I'm sure Dad would be up for the hunt when he gets back." He knew he should turn away and start walking towards the motel, but he couldn't quite manage it, not until he was sure Sam would follow.

Luckily, Sam didn't seem to notice. He sighed and turned towards home without prompting. "Can we have mac and cheese for dinner?"

"We've had mac and cheese every night this week, Sammy." Sam looked up at him with big sad eyes, and Dean couldn't help himself. He slung an arm around Sam's shoulders and said, "Fine, but I get to pick what we watch on TV tonight."

Sam nodded in agreement, and they walked home together in the early spring twilight.

*

iii.

Stanford was a fight Dean wasn't going to win. He knew that, but he tried anyway, right up until the moment Sam walked away. Dean followed him out of the motel room into the humid August morning, the asphalt of the parking lot warm against the soles of his bare feet, and watched until Sam disappeared into the cab of a truck heading west on I-80.

Dad went his own way a couple of weeks later, and Dean couldn't stop him either. He threw himself into hunting, instead. After a salt and burn in Provo and a black dog in Butte, Dean made his way to California, a trip that became familiar over the next three years, from all over the country.

When he managed to convince Sam to come with him to Jericho, he thought it might be the start of slowly easing Sam back into the hunting life (into his life, if he was honest about it). While he'd never expected what happened--never would have wished it on anyone, least of all Sam and Jess--he couldn't help but be glad that Sam was back where he belonged.

He didn't know why he was surprised when Sam walked away again, went chasing after Dad despite direct orders not to. He watched Sam in the rearview until he disappeared, and tried to tell himself it was the right thing to do.

Sam came back, though, came back and saved his ass in that orchard, and Dean started to relax, started to believe they could see this thing through together.

He should have known better, though; waking up to find Sam gone, without even a note left on his pillow, made that clear enough. Whatever Sam said when Dean caught up to him this time, Dean wouldn't let his guard down again.

*

iv.

Dean never expected to be in this position. Of all the crazy things he'd seen in his life, Sam turning into a demon blood junkie was never something he'd even considered possible. He'd be less surprised if someone told him Bigfoot actually existed. But the truth of it was right there in front of him, had been for months, even if he hadn't been able to see it for exactly what it was at first. And Dean had always tried to deal with what was in front of him head on.

He knew he hadn't exactly been easy to live with since he'd come back from hell, but he'd thought they were working it out. He knew Sam was lying to him, was still working with Ruby, still trusting her in ways that couldn't end well, but it had all spun out of control so quickly he was still reeling.

He lay there on the glass-strewn floor of the honeymoon suite and said the one thing he could think of. The one thing he knew Sam couldn't forgive.

"If you walk out that door, don't you come back."

He closed his eyes so that this time, he wouldn't have to watch Sam leave.

*

v.

Dean tells Sam the truth; he doesn't know if there's a way they can come back from this, but he has the apocalypse to worry about, and saving the world is more important than their hurt feelings and broken trust. He doesn't blame Sam for that, not really--Sam couldn't have broken the last seal if he hadn't broken the first, and he remembers that even if nobody else does.

But he can't spend all his time worrying that Sam's going to fall off the wagon, that he's going to do something stupid to try to make up for the stupid things he's already done. Not when he knows the world is going to end and it's up to them to stop it. Not when resentment that Sam trusted Ruby--that yet again, Sam walked out on him--is eating away at him from the inside like the acid Alastair liked to use on him in the pit.

When Sam sits down at that picnic table across from him, he looks more like Sam than he has in a long time, Dean thinks, probably since before Cold Oak. He knows a lot of that is on him, and he knows now that he made his share of stupid decisions. But when Sam says he needs to go, get his head on straight, as much as it makes Dean sick to his stomach, he has to agree. Dean's always believed they were stronger together, has fought with everything he's got to keep his family--to keep _Sam_\--close, and he just can't do it anymore. Right now, he isn't sure he's got anything left to give.

Dean's been watching Sam walk away his whole life. This is the first time Dean's let him go without a fight. This is the first time maybe Sam didn't want him to.

Dean hopes they both get to a point where Sam can come back, and they can start being brothers again. He hopes they get there before the world ends, but he's not holding his breath.

end

~*~

**Author's Note:**

> title and cut text from "Letter [Demeter to Persephone]" from Eating in the Underworld by Rachel Zucker.


End file.
